the sticks and stones house is located in corner brook, newfoundland, canada on the east side of town off of station road the late clyde farnell spent over 25 years of his life meticulously decorating the interior of his home, using tiny stones and thousands of popsicle sticks arranged in patterns on walls, shelves, cupboards, ceilings and door frames folk art paintings and three dimensional art completely cover every wall in the house, creating a warm feeling of a man who cherished everything from pop can lids to the front grills of old cars

when he died and others entered the house, his secret amazed the neighbors the university was notified and soon the house became protected as a folk art museum farnell was blinded in one eye as a child by a popsicle stick, which undoubtedly led to his obsession the number of popsicle sticks that cover the walls and ceiling are estimated at 53,000 our tour guides were an older man who was one of farnell's neighbors, and an eleven year old who is clyde farnell's grandson

where did he get all the popsicle sticks?

he bought them off the kids for ten cents

we've had it open for six, seven years now and it's hard to keep it going in the wintertime - keeping the lights and the oil going and everything

he wants to sell the house, do you know how much he's asking for it?

sixty-thousand dollars we clean it up three times a year - dust it, sweep it out, clean all the pictures and everything

this box over here, someone broke into it once couldn't break the locks so he used a crowbar some papers and things in there - there used to be money in there but it's all gone he had a lot of money stolen from here.

when you were young would you visit your grandfather a lot?

i was up here just about every day - he was a lot of fun

location: 12 farnell's lane, corner brook

admission: $2.00 adults; $1.00 students; under 12 $0.50

season: june, july, & august

telephone: (709) 634-3275/639-8156